A Mother's Touch
by leechi nut
Summary: Frigga loves deeply, or not at all. This shows in how she holds her two 'sons.' Odin/Frigga. Odin/Jord. One-shot.


_Disclaimer: I don't own these mythical figures. They are the property of Marvel via some Dark Age Norsemen._

 _A/N (beauty-blog style): In the comics, young Frigga has black hair. In the movie, it's reddish blond. In this fic, it's naturally dark but, as was historically common for the Rus and Gauls, is bleached with a strong, lye soap. Likewise, in the comics, young Odin has blond hair. In the movie, it's a sable tone. In this fic, it started light but, as is common for tow-headed children, has faded with age to a mousy brown._

 _Warning: This work is rated T for a reason! It includes planned partner infidelity and thoughts of violence towards children._

 **A Mother's Touch**

"My son and heir," is the introduction Odin gives for Thor as he sets the squalling infant in his wife's waiting arms.

Across the room, still-panting, half-naked, and blood-smeared, Thor'sbirth-mother flexes empty, yearning fingers, but the royal couple pay her no mind.

Instead, the king's entire attention is focused on his queen, and the queen's entire attention is focused on the child. Frigga stares intently into bright, blue eyes below light, blond brows in a red, wrinkled face… and waits to fall in love. She expects it to happen as instantly and irrevocably as it did with her husband—like a lightening bolt straight to the heart. But the seconds tick by, and Frigga feels nothing more than the vague discomfort that always accompanies handling someone else's child in her ceremonial role as _Allmother._ There are no convenient handmaids _here_ , though, to hand the crying baby off to with the excuse that he's disturbing court proceedings.

…At least, there are no handmaids here except for Jord (the still-panting, half-naked, blood-smeared birth-mother of what shouldhave _also_ been _Frigga's_ son and heir), so she won't be handing Thor back to _her_.

So, she clutches the baby she _doesn't want_ possessively to her breast and stares even more intently down at him, willing herself _desperately_ to fall in love. But Thor just squirms and shifts and screams. He doesn't want to be _clutched at possessively_ or _stared down at intently!_ No, he wants to be _fed_ and then _burped_ and then perhaps _have a nap_ —being born is hard work, after all!—and when none of that happens, he wails even more angrily in protest. After several long seconds of _that_ uglyruckus, Frigga has to admit that she'd like nothing better than to dash the child (this _bastard_ child!) against a wall!

Of course, she _doesn't!_

She isn't a _murderer!_ And even if she _were_ , she couldn't blame _Thor_ for being born of Odin and Jord. It isn't _his_ fault that the queen's lowly maidservant, rather than the king's high-born bride, brought him into the world. In fact, if anyone is at fault, it is Frigga herself, who all but foisted said servant onto her husband (and _now_ has regrets, fool woman!) when the mocking whispers at court about the "supposed fertility of the All _mother_ " became half-joking murmurs about "replacing _both_ Mom and Dad."

Talk like that, Frigga knows, can go from idle to incendiary in half a second. All it would take would be one added, "Seriously," and there could well be civil war! It wouldn't matter then that those first, petty grumblings came from the Asgardian women who once vied for Odin's affections (before Frigga swooped in from seemingly nowhere—from Vanaheim—and claimed the then-young king's heart). There would _always_ be grumblings when women didn't get their way (and even more so when that way was won by an _outlander_ ) _._ But those jilted noblewomen are now married to ambitious noblemen. Those ambitious noblemen form the collective Thing. And the Thing has the power (though it has never been used) to _unseat_ the Allfather if he fails to provide (for the safety and stability of the Realm Eternal) an heir to his throne.

It is this potential, political nightmare that spurs the queen's desperate plan: of secret surrogacy and slight-of-hand to pass that pregnancy off as her own.

The first step… Well, Frigga doesn't much like to think about Thor's conception… and thus, she thinks about it rather a lot. It's not that she imagines she was Odin's only partner _ever_ (see aforementioned jilted ex-lovers), but she is (or _was_ , until Jord) Odin's only partner since their marriage. But now, when her own womb has proved all but barren, Frigga can't help but worry that Odin will follow the footsteps of his father, who was married to foreign-born Bestla but sired Odin and his brothers, Vili and Ve, upon three separate (Aesir) concubines (who then proceeded to battle each other for their own son's ascendency—and by doing so, oust the old queen).

' _No_ ,' Frigga reminds herself sharply as she half-heartedly tries to soothe Thor, ' _that is why there's step number two: to protect both Odin's place on the throne and my own, at his side.'_

Though, really, that second step had almost been too easy! All it took to get a new rumor started at court was a bit of padding under the queen's close-cut kirtles and a few concealing gathers on top of Jord's. (And if a little bit of seidr was spun into the thread for those alterations? Well, the Aesir may have disdained most magic usage, but the Vanir had no such compunctions!) Then, some faux fainting spells in Asgard's outdoor markets brought the peasantry into the ploy. (And if the pallor of the queen's skin was in fact transformed flesh—the same sun-sheltered color beneath a bird's feathers? Well, if Frigga wanted to wear her be-spelled falcon-cloak inside-out on that day, that was nobody's business but hers!) The servants at Gladsheim, Odin's personal dwelling, needed a bit more convincing to buy the lie, but the promise of a proper Healer's apprenticeship in Lyfjaberg secured the renowned midwife, Eir, as a key accomplice, and no one would gainsay _her_. (Though if that slight loosening of morals in accepting the bribe coincided with a loosening of threads on the queen's magic loom? Well, no one was harmed! One might even say lives were saved!)

Then, with that deceptive groundwork laid, it was just a matter of time and play-acting before the midwife declared ("for the secure gestation of Asgard's heir") that it was time for the Allmother and a _very_ small retinue ("just myself and perhaps one other handmaid—an Aesir-Vanir pregnancy is unprecedented, after all, and we _must_ keep the stress to a minimum!") to begin their months-long seclusion. After _that_ , it was hurry up and wait.

…Wait to see if Thor would look similar enough to Frigga to fool the masses.

…And wait to see if Thor would look similar enough to Odin to fool Frigga's heart.

To the first, thankfully, the answer is yes. Thor's bright, blue eyes are a near perfect match to the queen's, and his light, blond hair… Well, no one in Asgard—except for Odin, of course, who seen every inch of Frigga's body—knows she's not naturally fair haired but instead bleaches black tresses to a harvest gold in the tradition Vanaheim's 'May-queens.'

To the second, though, sadly, no. Thor's bright, blue eyes could never be mistaken for the king's ever-shifting blue/gray/greens, and his light, blond hair… Well, Odin's had supposedly been the same color when he was an infant, but age had darkened and dulled it to an ash-bark brown by the time that Frigga first met him and fell in love—and _that_ was centuries ago.

In truth, however, if Thor looks like _anyone_ … Frigga cuts her eyes over to where Eir wipes down Jord's sticky thighs and catches the handmaid's gaze. Red-faced from exertion, Jord's summer-sky eyes seem even brighter, and her white-blond hair, even lighter. Thor looks _exactly_ like his mother. And in that instant, Frigga develops _step three_.

"Odin," she says aloud, "What do you know of Midgard?"

* * *

"A spare to my heir," is the introduction Odin gives for Loki when he returns from Midgard after years at war.

Realms away, farther even than the battle-scarred hills of Norway (where the Jotnar were discovered and repelled and replaced by Jord, who is now hailed by the mortals as "Mother Earth"), _Loki's_ dam flexes empty, yearning fingers (but will never be politely relocated from the scene of his child's theft).

Still, Laufey is out-of-sight, out-of-mind, and the Asgardian king's entire attention is focused on his queen. The queen's attention is focused, in turn, on the flailing, fussing, fabric-wrapped bundle being set into her arms.

"A spare… to your heir," she echoes in shock. Not 'a surety hostage from the Jotun camp.' Nor 'a fosterling dalt from some remarkable Human.' But 'a spare'—what can _only_ be a _bastard_ spare, Frigga thinks with rising ire—to Odin's bastard heir! "Did you sire him on Jord the instant you were out of my sight," she hisses, shoving the babe back toward her husband, "or on some hapless _milkmaid_ who thought you a _god?"_

Odin's (now single!) eye widens in shock, then narrows in anger. "You are a jealous, conniving, cruel wife," he answers (without actually _answering_ , Frigga notes angrily!). "And most days, I love you for it. But now…" He nods his head commandingly towards the boy and drops him back into her arms.

Frigga thins her lips but knows the difference between Odin, her _husband-and-equal,_ and Odin, _lord-and-king_. She begrudgingly peels back the blood-stained, makeshift swaddling…

And instantly (irrevocably) falls in love.

Little Loki's blue/gray/green eyes are _just_ like her husband's, and his Vanir-black brows are just like hers _would be_ if she didn't redden them along with her hair! In point of fact, little Loki looks like he was born of Frigga's own womb via Odin's own seed! He is everything Frigga had _hoped_ for Thor to be, and she exhales shakily, anger all but forgotten, at the thought. Carefully, as if expecting the illusion to somehow shatter, she caresses one downy, red, wrinkled cheek…

Only to gasp, "Oh!" in delighted surprise.

"Yes," Odin replies, and Frigga slants a look up to see if he saw (or rather, sensed) the incredible change that just occurred. For where an instant ago, Asgard's Allmother was holding an Aesir child (and between Thor and the dozens of leaving-for-war-potentially-never-to-return babies she's held at court recently, she _knows_ what an As feels like!), she now holds a full-blooded Vanr!

It's not anything the _eye_ can actually perceive—the difference between the two races. But Frigga actually _feels_ the change. She feels the shift from _kin_ -but-other to yes-same-perfect- _click!_ Those subtle sensations that are strange-and- _thrilling_ when her husband touches her (but are just-plain-strange with any other As) were all too present when Odin's arm still supported Loki. The boy's skin felt just a touch too firm (like gold made flesh instead of supple clay); his body seemed just a tad too hot (a scalding shield instead of sun-warmed field); and his scent laid just a smidge too flat (faintly metallic instead of richly loam-like). The instant Odin's hands withdraw, though, leaving Frigga skin-to-skin with the infant—oh! His skin suddenly yields (like ore liquefied); his temperature falls (summer air cooled by rain); and his scent blossoms out (paved earth tilled again). The Vanir-born queen breathes deep that unique baby-smell and thinks, ' _home.'_

A slow, dazzled smile—completely different from the one Frigga wears when she's play-acting 'mother' with Thor—works its way across her face. Because only one thing can explain that inexplicable change: The boy is hamrammr. Loki is a _skin changer_.

Now, it is true that the Aesir disdain most magic usage unless it's directly applicable to war. And it's true that skin-changing is one of those few lauded uses—provided a person's second skin is something large and predatory (a wolf or a bear, preferably) and can be sent out to decimate foes. (Frigga's bird-of-prey hamr is given a pass since she is female and foreign-born.) But what Loki has done—instinctively! as an infant! and with no like-shaped focus!—goes beyond putting on a be-spelled wolf-coat, bear-shirt, or falcon-cloak! He has shifted, not into the hamr of some mindless beast, but that of another _sentient_ _species!_ Frigga can only imagine what a fine spy the boy would thus make, and in truth, she really _should_ relay this information to her husband-and-general-and-king…

But Odin accused Frigga of being jealous, conniving, and cruel, and she freely owns the first two of those three. She is starved for the things of _home_ —of Vanaheim—stuck as she is in Asgard with the Aesir man she loves (but who often leaves on one campaign or another) and the Aesir 'son' she doesn't (though she has tried her very best!). Combined with the Aesir subjects she's largely indifferent to (except when they threaten palace coups), it creates a metaphysical monotone of same-same-same but slightly- _different_ -from-Frigga-herself. Indeed, if the the fabric of Asgard where laid out on the queen's magic loom, with each thread a person, there'd be a swathe of madder reds and weld golds, with her own, woad green sticking out like a colorblind gaff!

Who, then, could blame the Allmother (when she saw, in her mind's eye, little Loki's gold thread turn as green as hers, like mordanted wool taking overdye) if she wants to keep her new son (who, at the moment is an Vanir as she) and his abilities close to the vest?

And who, then, can blame the woman if she calls Loki _son_ and not _'son'?_

"Odin," she says aloud, "Thank you."


End file.
